The present invention relates generally to communication systems and methods and more specifically to communication systems and methods for facilitating online shopping.
The Internet is global and many e-commerce websites such as AMAZON™, MACY'S™, RALPH LAUREN™, VICTORIA'S SECRET™, etc., are accessible to shoppers all over the world. A typical user or shopper located in the U.S., for example, can initiate shopping by accessing a desired shopping website to browse and purchase items available for sale.
The user can browse and select items that are desirable for purchase. The selected items can thereafter be placed in a shopping cart or the like to accumulate all of the items that are purchased. After selection of the desired items is complete, the user can typically enter a shipping address where the goods are to be shipped. The user also enters a payment type such as a credit card or the like to complete the transaction. Once the shipping address and the credit card information are entered, the order is usually processed after which the purchased items are shipped to the user.
In other instances, however, the shopper may be located outside the geographical shipping boundary of the shopping website since many e-commerce sites do not ship items to certain geographic location. As an example, the user may be located in Nigeria, Armenia, Belize, etc. or other areas typically outside a geographical shipping area of a particular shopping website.
In such a case, after selection of desired items, the user similarly proceeds to enter a native shipping address. In response, the shopping website typically rejects the native address and prompts the shopper for an address within the shopping website's geographical shipping area.
Since the shopper does not reside within the geographical shipping area, the shopper cannot purchase items available for sale on the shopping website and ultimately the shopper becomes despondent. Although the shopper might seek and locate a different shopping website without such a shipping restriction, the items offered for sale by the different shopping website may not necessarily be as desirable as those items found on the shopping website with shipping restrictions.
Similarly, to pay for selected items, the shopper usually enters a payment type that is typically unacceptable or is not a payment type accepted by the shopping website. Upon entering such a payment type, the shopping website immediately rejects the payment type, again leaving the shopper with no suitable alternative but to discontinue shopping.
It is within the aforementioned context that a need for the present invention has arisen. Thus, there is a need to address one or more of the foregoing disadvantages of conventional systems and methods, and the present invention meets this need.